Quarterly Activity Report
FY2014 Quarter 1
(October - December, 2013)
Contents
1. NOAA Hosted WMO RSMC Meeting
2. New Capability Developed for NWS Forecasters
3. FOCAL - Alaska Study
4. Transport and Dispersion Modeling
5. Project Sagebrush
6. Birch Creek Valley Study
7. Tennessee Tracer Study
8. Improvements to Dispersion Modeling and Meteorological Display
9. Consequence Assessment for the Nevada National Security Site
10. HYSPLIT Model Back
Trajectories
11. Air-Surface Exchange Studies
12. Climate
Engineering Detectability Study
13. Climate Reference
Networks (CRN and USRCRN)
14. Soil Water Budget
Model
ARL 1st
Quarter Publications
Awards, Honors, Recognition
Outreach
1. NOAA Hosted WMO
RSMC Meeting
Glenn Rolph, Roland Draxler, and
Barbara Stunder participated in the World
Meteorological Organization (WMO) Commission for Basic Systems Expert Team on
Emergency Response Activities meeting at the University of
Maryland Alumni Center and the NOAA Center for Weather and Climate
Prediction (NCWCP), in College Park, MD.The purpose of the meeting was to review the relevant decisions of the
sixty-fifth session of the WMO Executive Council and statements adopted by the
fifteenth session of the Commission for Basic Systems.Representatives from each of the Regional
Specialized Meteorological Centers (RSMCs) with activity specialization in
Atmospheric Transport Modelling and Regional Telecommunications Hub Offenbach
presented the status of their respective implementations in relation to the
Regional and Global Arrangements, which have been maintained in collaboration
with the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA).In addition, the RSMCs responsible for both
nuclear and non-nuclear emergency response activities reviewed the status of
recent meeting action items. Representatives from IAEA, the International Civil
Aviation Organization and the Comprehensive Nuclear-Test-Ban Treaty
Organization also provided a briefing on their respective roles and the
relevance of meteorological information being made available by WMO RSMCs in
relation to their respective decision making processes. Meeting participants toured
the NCWCP building with special emphasis on the ARL dispersion modeling
capability and the operational capabilities of the National Weather Service. glenn.rolph@noaa.gov
2. New Capability
Developed for NWS Forecasters
National
Weather Service (NWS) forecasters indicated that they were having difficulty
providing all the HYSPLIT model graphics to their customers using email due to
the large file sizes and some file extensions.To address this problem, ARL began development, in collaboration with
the Web Operations Center (WOC) personnel, of a web site that could be provided
to emergency managers to give them direct access to a web page similar to that
forecasters use to display the HYSPLIT model results.This new capability is currently being tested
by several forecasters and should be available to all forecasters in January,
2014. glenn.rolph@noaa.gov
3. FOCAL- Alaska Study
The Atmospheric
Turbulence and Diffusion (ATDD) rendered the data collected from the Flux
Observations of Carbon from an Airborne Laboratory (FOCAL) Alaska Study as
meteorologically useful.ATDD produced
values of methane flux about 20 percent lower than those collected from ATDD's surface
site, located near the flight transect in similar terrain. This result shows
that the data are sufficiently good for use in preliminary scientific analysis,
at least after some adjustments to better coordinate the multiple raw data
streams feeding the nonlinear computations. ATDD also identified areas for
improvement for next year's deployment. Results from the FOCAL - Alaska Study were
presented at the Fall Meeting of the American Geophysical Union in December
2013. ron.dobosy@noaa.gov, E. Dumas, B.
Baker, and J. Kochendorfer
4. Transport and Dispersion Modeling
We received informal notification
that the review of the HYSPLIT Radiological Software Quality Assurance plan (HYRad SQA) and its gap analysis were successfully
completed. The successful review means that HYRAD has been accepted for
inclusion in the DOE Emergency Managers Issues Special Interest Group (EMI SIG)
Subcommittee on Consequence Assessment and Protective Actions (SCAPA)
Consequence Assessment Model Toolbox. The appropriate documentation and other
protocols required by the Toolbox have been maintained since the second quarter
of FY2013 when the package was submitted for review. dennis.finn@noaa.gov
5. Project Sagebrush
The Field Research Division began
Phase 1 of Project Sagebrush. The University of Tennessee Space Institute's Piper
Navajo aircraft was fitted with a Trace Gas Analyzer (TGA) for sampling the SF6
tracer used in the project. Although the weather did not cooperate, three
tracer releases were made during the first week of October which the UTSI
aircraft could participate in. Due to continued bad weather, FRD extended Phase
1 an additional week to conduct two more releases without the aircraft. This
entailed reducing the tracer release rate and moving some of the tracer
samplers closer to the source. Overall, the one-week extension of the study
allowed FRD to meet its original objective of completing five successful tracer
releases.
Quality control and assurance
analyses of the bag sampler tracer data set for allfive tests have been largely completed
and data has been flagged appropriately or corrected as necessary. This process
should be completed early in the next quarter. Quality control and assurance
analyses of the fast-response tracer data set began but were not yet completed.
A preliminary consolidation and
review of the extensive suite of Project Sagebrush meteorological measurements
has been completed. A much more detailed analysis of the meteorological data
will be conducted when the tracer data become available in order to link
observed tracer plume dispersion with measured turbulence and other
meteorological data. The Grid 3 tall tower was heavily instrumented for Project
Sagebrush with additional sonic anemometers provided by FRD and additional
extensive turbulence and energy balance instrumentation provided by Washington
State University. All of the tower instrumentation will remain in place
indefinitely in an ongoing study of the structure of vertical turbulence in a
wide range of meteorological conditions.
An abstract "Project Sagebrush:
Revisiting Short-range Dispersion Using Modern Instrumentation" by Rick Eckman, Kirk Clawson, Dennis Finn, and Roger Carter was
accepted for an oral presentation at the 2014 American Meteorological Society
Annual Meeting in Atlanta. The presentation will give an overview of the
project and some preliminary results from Phase 1.richard.eckman@noaa.gov, Kirk Clawson, Dennis Finn, and Roger Carter
6. Birch Creek Valley study
The Field Research Division (FRD)
began analysis of the Birch Creek dataset. This dataset includes data acquired
by FRD staff on the monthly/seasonal changes in diurnal flow patterns,
especially with respect to the interaction between mountain valley flows and
flows on the Snake River Plain. FRD also conducted a preliminary analysis of data
on individual wind events featuring unusual flow patterns and abrupt temporal
and/or spatial changes. Further analyses of this data will be conducted pending
the availability of the higher spatial resolution datasets acquired by our USFS
Fire Sciences Laboratory partners.The
Fire Sciences Laboratory anticipates their data will be available around March,
2014. dennis.finn@noaa.gov
7. Tennessee Tracer Study
The Tennessee Valley Authority
(TVA) is proposing to install a modular nuclear reactor at a site near Oak
Ridge, TN. A fast breeder reactor was planned at this site back in the 1970s,
but that reactor was ultimately canceled. As part of the planning for the
modular reactor, there has been some discussion about conducting a tracer study
at the proposed site. A preliminary meeting in Oak Ridge is planned for the
spring of 2014 to discuss developing a proposal for a tracer study. The
University of Tennessee Space Institute is involved in the planning after their
successful use of FRD's tracer equipment in their aircraft during Project
Sagebrush. richard.eckman@noaa.gov, Kirk Clawson
8. Improvements to Dispersion Modeling and
Meteorological Display
FRD began transitioning away from
MDIFF and INLViz for its dispersion modeling and
meteorological display.HYSPLIT and Viz+ are the primary replacements for these two
applications and are intended for users needing more sophisticated
capabilities.HYSPLIT expands
substantially on MDIFF's concentrations calculations.In addition to concentration, HYSPLIT will
calculate dose and deposition directly.Viz+ expands INLViz capabilities
by providing data in daily chunks as opposed to 5 minute chunks.This provides the ability to display daily graphical
and summary data.By using Google Maps,
both applications provide more sophisticated mapping displays.These are but a few of the many improvements
these new applications provide.For
users needing just current weather conditions, FRD has replaced the windvector page with a new page, also built around Google
Maps. The URL for this new web page is http://www.noaa.inel.gov/mvp/iviz.This
page is also accessible from FRD's NIWC page. brad.reese@noaa.gov
9. Consequence Assessment for the Nevada
National Security Site
The Special Operations and
Research Division (SORD) participated in an emergency response exercise as the
Consequence Assessment Team for the NNSA Nevada Field Office.The exercise was conducted on the Nevada
National Security Site (NNSS).In this
exercise, SORD provided site specific weather data and weather forecasts, and
generated dispersion products based on the worst case event scenario
information provided for the facility involved.The exercise event was a transportation accident in a warehouse which
created a chemical spill.SORD also performed
its role as Weather Subject Matter Experts. kip.smith@noaa.gov, Rick Lantrip,
James Wood, Walt Schalk
10. HYSPLIT Model
Back Trajectories
Ariel Stein collaborated with Dr.
Francois De Vleeschouwer from EcoLab,
France to determine the origin of geological samples taken in southern South
America. A series of HYSPLIT back trajectory runs were performed for 60 years
to determine the sources of metals that have been deposited in Tierra del
Fuego, Argentina. The results of this work will be submitted to Nature
Communication as a research paper. ariel.stein@noaa.gov
11. Air-Surface
Exchange Studies
LaToya Myles and Mark Heuer,
along with Jason Caldwell and Daryl Sibble from the
NOAA Environmental Cooperative Science Center, prepared for a spring 2014
deployment of instruments to measure ammonia emissions from fertilized maize at
the University of Illinois-Urbana-Champaign (UIUC) Energy Farm.A detailed sampling plan and QA/QC document
were finalized and shared with collaborators at UIUC.In addition, the team explored the use of the
SURFATM model, a bi-directional model for heat and pollutant exchange between
the biosphere and the atmosphere partitioning the soil and the plant layers.
SURFATM could be used to simulate bidirectional exchange of ammonia. latoya.myles@noaa.gov
LaToya Myles continued to co-chair NOAA's
Ecosystem Research Strategy Committee.The Committee provided status updates to the NOAA Research Council and
the R&D Enterprise Committee.In
addition, the Committee agreed to host a roundtable discussion to identify
ecosystem research priorities for a demonstration pilot in the Gulf of Mexico. latoya.myles@noaa.gov
12. Climate
Engineering Detectability Study
ARL's
Dian Seidel and colleagues from NOAA's Earth System Research Laboratory (Graham
Feingold and Andy Jacobson) and from NASA Langley Research Center (Norman Loeb)
completed a study on the ability of scientists to detect an increase in Earth's
albedo caused by a potential climate engineering experiment or program. Some
climate engineering proposals are aimed at deliberately increasing the
refection of sunlight away from Earth to counteract warming due to greenhouse
gasses, for example by injecting reflective particles into the stratosphere, by
modifying clouds, or by changing the land surface characteristics of cultivated
or built environments. The main finding of the study is that detection of
albedo increases would be limited by the variability of the climate system, so
that only very large interventions could be unambiguously detected, assuming
current satellite observations of incoming and reflected sunlight are continued
in the future. Dian presented a talk on this research at the
American Geophysical Union 2013 Fall Meeting in December 2013, and a poster
presentation will be given at the SPARC (Stratosphere-Troposphere Processes and
their Role in Climate) General Assembly (January 2014). A
"Perspectives" article on this work will be published in Nature
Climate Change. dian.seidel@noaa.gov
ATDD staff
made twenty-four site visits, including a visit to the Marshall Test Site in
Colorado and visits to Alabama to handle rain gauges. mark.e.hall@noaa.gov
14. Soil Water Budget Model
Tim
Wilson continued development of a soil water budget model to quantify the
surplus, sufficiency, and deficit of soil water conditions, which are
important to water resources in the U.S. The model is being developed as a
simple, semi-empirical model to estimate the change in soil water based on soil
moisture and climate observations from the USCRN sites. Preliminary model test results indicate that changes in the soil water
content occur from the combined effect of complicated dynamic processes related
to variations in the climate, vegetation and soil. tim.wilson@noaa.gov
ARL 1st Quarter
Publications
Published:
Chai, T., H. C. Kim, P. Lee, D. Tong, L. Pan, Y. Tang,
J. Huang, J. McQueen, M. Tsidulko, and
I. Stajner
(2013). Evaluation of the United States National Air Quality Forecast
Capability experimental real-time predictions in 2010 using Air Quality System
ozone and NO2 measurements. Geoscientific Model Development6
(5), 1831-1850. doi:10.5194/gmd-6-1831-2013.
Cheng, FY, Z.M. Yang, C.F. Ou-Yang,
and F. Ngan (2013). A numerical study of the dependence of
long-range transport of CO to a mountain station in Taiwan on synoptic weather
patter during the Southeast Asia biomass-burning season. Atmospheric Environment. 78:277-290. doi:10.1016/j.atmosenv.2013.03.020.
Free, M. and B. Sun (2013). Time-varying biases
in U.S. total cloud cover data. Journal of Atmospheric and Oceanic
Technology, 30, 2838-2849. http://dx.doi.org/10.1175/JTECH-D-13-00026.1
Hegarty, J., R. Draxler, A.
Stein, J. Brioude, M. Mountain, J. Eluszkiewicz, T. Nehrkorn, F. Ngan, and A. Andrews (2013). Evaluation of Lagrangian Particle
Dispersion Models with Measurements from Controlled Tracer Releases. Journal of Applied
Meteorology and Climatology. 52,
2623-2637. http://dx.doi.org/10.1175/JAMC-D-13-0125.1
, , , , , , , , and (2013). Urban measurements of atmospheric nitrous acid: A caveat on
the interpretation of the HONO photostationary state, Journal of Geophysical
Research -Atmospheres. 118, 21, 12,274-12,281.
http://dx.doi.org/10.1002/2013JD020341
Milford,
C., N. Castell, C. Marrero, S. Rodríguez, A.M. Sánchez de la Campa, R. Fernández-Camacho, J.
de la Rosa, A. F. Stein (2013). Measurements and
simulation of speciated PM2.5 in south-west Europe.Atmospheric Environment. 77: 36-50. http://dx.doi.org/10.1016/j.atmosenv.2013.04.050
Ngan, F., H. Kim, P. Lee, B. Dornblaser,
and K. Al-Wali (2013). A study on
nocturnal surface wind speed over-prediction by the WRF-ARW model in
Southeastern Texas. Journal
of Applied Meteorology and Climatology. Volume 52, Issue 12, 2638-2653. http://dx.doi.org/10.1175/JAMC-D-13-060.1
Zhang, Y., D. J. Seidel, and S. Zhang. (2013). Trends in
Planetary Boundary Layer Height over Europe. Journal of Climate. 26 (24),
10071-10076. http://dx.doi.org/10.1175/JCLI-D-13-00108.1
Worton, David
R. Jason D.
Surratt, Brian W. LaFranchi, Arthur W. H.
Chan, Yunliang Zhao, Robin J. Weber, Jeong-Hoo Park, Jessica B. Gilman, Joost de Gouw, Changhyoun Park, Gunnar Schade, Melinda
Beaver, Jason M. St. Clair, John Crounse, Paul
Wennberg, Glenn
M. Wolfe, Sara Harrold, Joel A.
Thornton, Delphine K. Farmer, Kenneth S.
Docherty, Michael J. Cubison, Jose-Luis
Jimenez, Amanda A. Frossard, Lynn M.
Russell, Kasper Kristensen, Marianne Glasius, Jingqiu Mao, Xinrong Ren, William Brune, Eleanor
C. Browne, Sally E. Pusede, Ronald C.
Cohen, John H. Seinfeld, and Allen H. Goldstein (2013) Observational Insights into Aerosol
Formation from Isoprene. Environmental Science & Technology 47(20):11403-11413. doi:10.1021/es4011064
Conference Presentations
Barbara Stunder presented a
poster "A new web site for running HYSPLIT for volcanic ash" at the 2nd International
Union of Geodesy and Geophysics (IUGG) - World Meteorological Organization
(WMO) workshop on ash dispersal forecast and civil aviation, in Geneva,
Switzerland. The poster described the quantitative volcanic ash HYSPLIT
simulations that may be run in READY (https://www.ready.noaa.gov/HYSPLIT_ash.php).The purpose of the meeting was to provide
updates on the current status of research and capabilities since the 1st
meeting which was held 3 years ago in the aftermath of the eruption of Eyjafjallajokull, Iceland, and to facilitate and promote
interaction among the international community of meteorological and volcanological experts dealing with the ash and aviation
safety issue.
Ariel Stein presented two
talks on Western U.S. Monitoring and Analysis: Progress and Current Issues at
the 2013 National Atmospheric Deposition Program Annual Fall Meeting and Scientific
Symposium in Park City, Utah.
Rick Saylor presented a poster at the International
Aerosol Modeling Algorithms bi-annual conference at the University of
California-Davis. The poster, entitled "Secondary Organic Aerosol
Concentrations and Fluxes from an Isoprene Emission Dominated Forest
Canopy" documents continued application of the Atmospheric Chemistry and
Canopy Exchange Simulation System (ACCESS) to data obtained at the Walker
Branch Watershed flux tower in 1999. In this work, levels of background NOx concentrations were found to significantly influence
both the magnitude and chemical composition of fluxes of secondary organic
aerosol (SOA) precursors from the canopy and may influence the pathways by
which SOA formation occurs.
American Geophysical Union Meeting:
Praveena Krishnan presented "Comparison of in-situ, aircraft, and
satellite based land surface temperature measurements over a mixed agricultural
region" by Praveena Krishnan; Bruce Baker; John Kochendorfer; Edward Dumas; Tilden P. Meyers; Pierre Guillevic; Stephan Corda; John Muratore; and Devon Simmons. The presentation was on the land surface
temperature measurements made during the campaign mode experiments conducted
over a mixed agricultural area near Bondville,
Illinois during 2012 and 2013.
John Kochendorfer presented
"Flux Of Carbon from an Airborne Laboratory (FOCAL):
Synergy of airborne and surface measures of carbon emission and isotopologue content from tundra landscape in Alaska" by
Ron Dobosy, Ed Dumas, D. S. Sayres, and
John Kochendorfer.
LaToya Myles presented "Sources and Sinks:
Ammonia Flux in Agricultural Ecosystems." LaToya was also a co-convener of a poster session entitled Opening Doors
to Geoscience Research Through Experiential Learning
Opportunities.
Awards, Honors, Recognition
Winston Luke, and colleagues from the
National Weather Service, National Environmental Satellite, Data, and
Information Service, and the Office of the Chief Administrative Officer, received
the Department of Commerce 2013 Silver Medal Award for exceptional team
achievements in creating the NOAA Center for Weather and Climate Prediction
(NCWCP), a state-of-the-art facility that enhances our ability to meet our
global atmospheric challenges.The
Silver Medal is the second highest honorary award granted by the Secretary of
Commerce. The Silver Medal is defined as exceptional performance characterized
by noteworthy or superlative contributions which have a direct and lasting
impact within the Department.
Outreach
Kip Smith, Phil Abbott, and Walt Schalk made final plans and preparations to "go live" with a new SORD website on January 7, 2014.The new website will feature the ability of the user to select the weather parameters to view, user selected lightning strike time windows and facility distance rings, and Google Map backgrounds and features.
James Wood and Walt Schalk gave a brief talk and demonstration of SORD
capabilities and responsibilities to the Federal Nuclear Expertise
Program.The talk was held outside at
the Desert Rock Weather Observatory on the Nevada National Security Site.A PIBAL balloon was released as part of the
demonstration.Attendees represented
DOE/NNSA Headquarters and the DOE/NNSA National Laboratories.